On the old house of Compton Wynyates, in Warwickshire, which
belongs to the Marquis of Northampton. It is sometimes called
"Compton in the Hole" from its
position, as it stands in a deep hollow
surrounded by hills and woods, and
seemingly shut in to perpetual loneliness. It is a grand old hall, and was
built by Sir William Compton (temp.
Henry VIII.), who is said to have
brought the curious chimneys from
the castle of Fulbrook, which is demolished. He stood in the favour
of his king, and may be said to have founded the Compton family as
noble. His grandson was created Earl of Northampton by James I.,
and was father of "the loyal earl," who followed Charles I., and grandfather of Compton, Bishop of London, who opposed James II. The
old house suffered much in the Civil Wars, and is now dismantled.
It is built round a court, and surrounded by a moat. The roof and
ceilings are in good repair. It contains a small chapel for secret celebration of the Mass, with private staircases. The dial is on the south
side of the house, overlooking what was formerly the Pleasaunce.
There is a second dial over the main entrance, declining west, and a
third on a pedestal in the garden. See No. 1172.

This text, from Psalm cxxxix. II, is on a dial erected by Albert
Fleming, Esq., in his grounds at Neaum Crag, Westmoreland. The
pedestal is of native slate. Mr. Fleming is well known as the benefactor who has revived the use of the spinning-wheel amongst the
housewives in Langdale. He erected the dial to the memory of his
mother, whose initials and the date of whose death are given after the
text. To her memory, also, the following lines have been engraved on
the base of the pedestal; they were chosen as being specially appropriate to Mrs. Fleming's vigorous and dauntless character:

"O strong soul, by what shore
Tarriest thou now? For that force,
Surely, has not been left vain!
Somewhere, surely, afar,
In the sounding labour-house vast
Of being, is practised that strength.
Zealous, beneficent, firm!"

Formerly in the great court of the Sorbonne. Paris, on a fine vertical
dial, with an admirable design of Apollo driving the chariot of the Sun.
The motto was also in the court of the Célestin Convent, Paris, now
destroyed; and has been read at Le Ciotât (Bouches du Rhône). The
three first words were on the Château de Preuilly (Seine et Marne).

On the church porch of St. Levan, Cornwall. The church is rich
in old oak, and also possesses a fragmentary copy of the letter of thanks
written by King Charles I. to his people of Cornwall for their fidelity,
dated from his camp at Sudeley Castle, 1643, and ordered to be printed,
published, and read in every church or chapel in Cornwall, and to be
kept for ever as a record of their king's gratitude.

On a tower which forms part of a large eighteenth-century building
in the market-place, Fano, Italy. Miss Helen Zimmern, who saw it
in 1892, adds "the good advice of the motto did not seem to be
generally obeyed in its vicinity."

in a window of the church of St. Benet Fink, Threadneedle Street,
now destroyed. The foundation of this church was very ancient, but
it was rebuilt by Robert Fink the elder in 1633, and after being burnt
down, was again rebuilt in 1673. The following extract from the
"Saint's Nosegay," by Mr. Samuel Clark, minister of this church from
1642-66, may serve to illustrate the motto: "If the sunne be wanting
it will be night for all the stars; so if the light of God's countenance
be wanting, a man may sit in the shadow of death for all the glyster of
worldly contentment. As light continues not in the house, but by its
dependance on the sun: shut out that, and all the light and beauty is
presently gone: so we can see nothing but by the constant supply of
the spirit of Christ. Hee that begins must finish every good work
in us."

On a church at Ornavasso, Lago Maggiore, and at Vevey. With
the last word omitted, it is at Cordes (Tarn); and in several other
French villages; and was formerly at La Charité, Paris; and at
Puisseaux.

On the church tower at Hoole, Lancashire, dated 1815; on a house
at Ashwick, near Bath; at Goldney House, Clifton, erected by Lewis
Fry, Esq.; and in Chorley Churchyard, Lancashire. On the tower of
Shillington Church, Bedfordshire, a clock and a sun-dial were formerly
to be seen, the sun-dial having this motto, and the clock, as a contrast.
Sine sole loquor (without the sun I speak). The dial has now been
removed.

The motto is on the chapel of St. Philippe, Nice; in the Castle of
Monastero, near Bormida; and has been read at Vevey; at Pino.
Piedmont; and at Alghero in Sardinia.

in stone and bearing this motto, on the façade of the Maison du Roi,
or Broodhuys, at Brussels. This fine old building is opposite the
Hôtel de Ville, in the square where the executions of Counts Egmont
and Horn took place. The Broodhuys has undergone many alterations. It was built about 1525. and in it the two noblemen passed
the night before their execution, but it seems to have been rebuilt
in 1668, by order of the Archdukes Albert and Isabella, and again
altered in 1757. Until a recent restoration it bore on its façade
the following inscription, which contains a chronogram of the date
1624:

SO ROLLS THE SUN, SO WEARS THE DAY,
AND MEASURES OUT LIFE'S PAINFUL WAY:
THROUGH SHIFTING SCENES OF SHADE AND LIGHT,
TO ENDLESS DAY OR ENDLESS NIGHT.
FOR THE LADY ABNEY AT NEWINGTON, 1735.

These lines were written by Dr. Watts as the motto on a pillar-dial
which formerly stood in the garden of Lady Abney at Stoke Newington.
Dr. Watts being resident there as tutor in the family of Sir J. Hartopp.
Sir Thomas Abney was Lord Mayor of London in 1700, and died in
1722. The dial has been removed to Edmond Castle, near Carlisle,
the residence of T. H, Graham, Esq. Mr. H. Hopley has noted a
different version of the lines, without recording any locality:

"So glide the hours, so wears the day,
These moments measure life away,
With all its trains of Hope and Fear;
Till shifting scenes of Shade and Light
Rise to Eternal Day, or sink in endless Night."

Dr. Watts' lines are also on a dial placed, in 1880, on the village
school, Carthorpe, Yorkshire.

SO TEACH US TO NUMBER OUR DAYS,
THAT WE MAY APPLY OUR HEARTS UNTO WISDOM (Ps. xc. 12).

On the porch of St. John's Church, Leeds. The dial was put up
after the restoration of the church, about A.D. 1868, in place of one
removed forty years previously. Also in Trefnant churchyard (see
No. 1295); and on the porch of Mancetter Church, Warwickshire.
There is no date, but a dial is shown in an engraving of 1763.

SOL ET LUNA FACIUNT QUAE PRECEPTA SUNT EIS: NOS AUTEM PEREGRINAMUR A DOMINO. The sun and moon do what hath been bidden them, but we wander away from the Lord.

Near a great sun-dial on the parish church of St. Affrique (Aveyron).
and described by Mr. Barker in his "Wanderings by Southern Waters."
"The extraordinary astronomical dials," he writes, "cover most of the
surface of the outer walls. They are exceedingly curious, and some of
the calculations really astonishing, as e.g., a table showing the number
of souls that have appeared before the tribunal of God." Baron de
Rivière gives both this and another motto in French; possibly both
versions may be on the dials (see No. 212).

On the church of St, Stephen by Saltash, which is the original
parish church of Saltash, the names of Joseph Avery and Savell
Doidge, 1783, are also engraved on the dial. The motto is on three of
Zarbula's dials in the Hautes Alpes. Also on a farmhouse at Coldthorpe, Gloucestershire, the last word being omitted.

This motto, with No. 443, is on a handsome pillar bearing a horizontal dial of slate at Ember Court, Surrey. The inscriptions are
somewhat defaced. Besides the central dial there are four small ones
at the four corners, showing the time of day at other places on the
earth's surface. The same text is on dials at Areley Kings, Cheshire;
(No. 74) at Ninane, Belgium; La Fiera di Primiero, Tyrol (No. 426);
and at Bozel, Savoy.

Several dials made by Richard Melvin of London, and apparently
also of Dublin, are noticed in this work. They are usually of slate,
horizontal, and engraved with great care, sometimes showing the time
at places abroad, and accompanied by smaller dials at the sides, in
the corners, which are for the same purpose. Three of Melvin's dials
are in Warwickshire, another at Ruthin Castle, one at Dover, and one
at Killiney, dated 1864. Some have mottoes, and some not.

to make sense of this obscure motto, and have failed. The first allusion
to the mythological legend of Saturn devouring his children will be
recognized; and the accompanying simile can only be explained by a
reference to the favourite Italian game of pallone. This game somewhat resembles tennis, and still remains a living representative of the
old Roman game of pila. The manner of playing it has been thus
described by Mr. Story ("Roba di Roma," vol. i.): "It is played
between two sides, each numbering from five to eight persons. Each
of the players is armed with a bracciale, or gauntlet of wood, covering
the hand and extending nearly up to the elbow, with which a heavy ball
is beaten backwards and forwards, high into the air, from one side to
another. The object of the game is to keep the ball in constant flight,
and whoever suffers it to fall dead within the bounds loses. The game
is played on an oblong figure, marked out on the ground, or designated
by the wall around the sunken platform on which it is played, and
across the centre is a transverse line dividing the two sides; and as the
ball falls here and there, now flying high in the air, and caught at once
by the bracciale before touching the ground, now glancing back from
the wall which generally forms one side of the lists, the players rush
eagerly to hit it, calling loudly to each other, and often displaying great
agility, skill, and strength." Allusions to the game of pallone may be
found in the works of the modern Italian poets. Leopardi and Aleardi
have both made use of it as a subject of their verse. The above motto
was ultimately shown to Antonio Maschio, a gondolier in the service of
the National Bank at Venice, well-known for his interpretation of
Dante's "Divina Commedia." He said at once that the word tempo
should be temo, and then the meaning would be, "I fear only the devouring tooth of Saturn and the inexpert player with the ball" – that is, the
gnomon fears alike Saturn's wet weather which corrodes iron, and the
bad pallone player who may throw his ball against and break it.

SOL TIBI SIGNA DABIT: SOLEM QUIS DICERE FALSUM AUDEAT?The
sun will give thee the signs: who will dare to say the sun is false? (From Virgil's First Georgic, line 463.)

This is the motto of a sun-dial on one of the terraces at Bramshill
Park, Hants. At the same place there are three other dials, which bear
the arms of the Cope family with dates and initials, but they have no
mottoes.

This was the motto of the old "Sun" newspaper. Dryden's translation of the line runs:

"The sun reveals the secret of the day.
And who dares give the source of light the lie?"

The first part of the motto, SOL TIBI SIGNA DABIT, was, until 1852, on
the Bridge Trust Building, Bideford, erected in 1755. It is still on
the wall of the cloister of St. Stefano, Belluno, now used as a public
building. See No. 1434.

The latter half of the line is on a dial at Newbiggin, near Carlisle,
dated 1722 and inscribed "Carolus Aedes delineavit, Johannes Gosling
sculpt."; also on St. Mary's Church, Penzance, with No. 1334; this dial
was removed from the old church to the present modern building. See
also No. 1053.

At Abriès. The dial, like many of those made by Zarbula, is
ornamented with pictures of birds; here there is a toucan and a parakeet, with their names attached. The motto, imperfectly rendered, is
also at Le Pinet (Hautes Alpes).

Outside the Dean's kitchen at Durham is a dial which bears this inscription. In 1888 it was much decayed. The motto comes from
Martial's "Epigrams," v. 20, 23. It is also over the south porch of
Woodhorn Church, Northumberland, with letters T. R. S. and 1840.

This inscription is cut on several stones in Nuremberg, and may
have belonged to dials which have been removed. It is also on a portable ivory compass dial in the Nuremberg Museum, made by Paulus
Reinman, 1602; on another in the British Museum, "Paulus Reinmann
zu Normberg, faciebat 1578"; on two marked "Nicolavs Miller,
1645," and on many similar dials in other collections. See No. 1320.

On an old dial at Queyrières, and at other villages in the Hautes
Alpes. The words used to be often found inscribed over old house
doorways in Edinburgh; amongst others over the notorious Major
Weir's house, dated 1604. Mr. Robert Chambers tells us that in the
reign of Queen Mary the above was the "fashionable grace before
meat" of the Scottish nobility.

made a central point where the gnomon was fixed. The same
words have also been read at Bonneville; at Château Queyras (see
No. 48); and in other villages in Dauphiné, in one case with the
date 1700. They are also at Mouriez (Bouches
du Rhône), on the house where Nostradamus
once lived, and is said to have been placed there
by the prophet himself. He died July 2nd, 1566.

The word SOLI alone has been seen on a dial
in the hamlet of Ozier (Isère); and SOLI, SOLI on
others in the hamlets of La Valadière, and of
Légerie (Isère). The representation of the sun
as a human face with rays all round it, which is
often seen on dials, is of very ancient origin. It has been found
carved in relief at Babain in Upper Egypt, with figures of priests
below offering sacrifice. In this manner the Persians also represented
the Sun God, as well as in the form of a young man, Mithras. It is
possible that the words, Soli, soli, soli, and Deo soli gloria (which may
bear a double meaning), were originally Mithraic inscriptions. Under
the Roman Empire there were altars set up to Mithras with the inscription, Deo invicto Mithrae. Several have been found in England
inscribed Deo soli, To God the sun; Deo soli invicto, To God the sun
unconquerable. That traces of this ancient worship should still be
found on sun-dials need surprise no one. [If Soli, soli, soli, be indeed a
Mithraic inscription, it probably should be translated, "To the peerless
sun, we only," i.e., the secret society of Mithraists. – R. F. L.]

These lines are engraved on the eight sides of a shaft in the
vicarage garden, Shenstone, near Lichfield, upon the top of which is
a cross dial (see Nos.
474 and
1384), erected and inscribed by the Rev. R. W. Essington. On a slate step at the shaft's base there are two
more mottoes, one in Greek and the other in Hebrew:
(1)
ὡραν
διδωσι
+
ὀντος
ἡλιου
(the word
σταῦρος, a cross,
being supplied by +). The cross gives the hour in sunshine.
And, (2)
י
ח
י
א
ו
ֹ
ד
.
Let there be light.

Two other translations have been
made of the Latin lines, but the one
given above seems to follow the original
more closely than the rest.

(1) Sunlight falls, and lo! the Cross's shadow fain would teach
To us the present hour by heaven is lent!
Night darkens, and then no longer can the shadow preach,
Avoid delay, your time is almost spent.

(2)
Light falls from heaven!
Then doth the Cross's shade
This lesson sweetly teach:
Thy time – Heaven's grace!
Night's deeper shades
Close round! the voice is hushed
So soon that grace is spent,
It flies apace,
Hold on thy race.

SPECTATOR FASTIDIOSUS SIBI MOLESTUS. He that looks too proudly
is a trouble to himself.

At Bywell Abbey, near Newcastle-on-Tyne. It is difficult to
understand what this motto means; we have translated it literally. It
may either point to a spectator bending over the dial so as to intercept
the sunshine; or as a passer-by who is too proud to use this humble
means of learning the time.

On the stone pedestal of a dial at Niddrie Marischal, near Edinburgh, the seat of the Don Wauchopes. The arms of the family are
engraved on the bronze dial face, and also on the pedestal, but the
motto is not their heraldic one. The words, Wachop of Niddrie, are
inscribed beside the shield on the face; and also Jacobus Clarke,
Dundee, fecit. There is no date.

There is an ancient dial, having four sides, at Millrigg, in the parish
of Culgaith, near Penrith. The opening dialogue betwixt Dial and
Passenger is inscribed on one side of the square, and on the other side
is Dial's moral deduction from it.
The two remaining sides of the
square are occupied by the armorial
bearings of the families of Dalston
and Fallowfield, together with the
initials "I. D." and "H. F." John
Dalston resided and died at Millrigg in 1692. He was the son of
Sir Christopher Dalston, of Acorn
Bank, who was knighted by James I.
in 1615. This latter place was the
chief residence of the family. The
manor of Temple Sowerby, immediately adjoining, was granted by
Henry VIII. to Thomas Dalston, Esq., on the distribution of religious
houses. It belonged originally to the Knights Templars, and afterwards to the Hospitallers. Millrigg is now occupied as a farm-house.

In the principal square at Annecy a meridian dial was placed by
Frère Arsène, a Capuchin, the maker of several dials set up at different
places in Savoy. This one is described in a brochure, "Le Montre
Solaire d'Annecy." There were, as is often the case, dials of different
kinds on the same stone. On the south side were two equinoctial
dials, with the mottoes given above, and the additional lines:

SUNS RISE AND SET,
TILL MEN FORGET
THE DAY IS AT THE DOOR
WHEN THEY SHALL RISE NO MORE.
O EVERLASTING SUN,
WHOSE RACE IS NEVER RUN,
BE THOU MY ENDLESS LIGHT,
THEN SHALL I FEAR NO NIGHT.
In Memoriam T. E. W. D., 1880.

These lines, with Prov. x. 7, and Ps. xc. 12, are on two sides of a
column bearing a dial, in the churchyard of Trefnant, co. Denbigh.
It was erected by Mrs. Whitehall Dod, of Llanerch. There are also
devices, such as the cross within a triangle, a sickle, and an hour-glass
inclosed in a serpent ring. See No. 1226.

One of eight mottoes that were inscribed on an octagonal pillar
bearing a dial on each side, which stood in front of the Exhibition
Buildings at Edinburgh in 1886. There was also an inscription stating
that the Exhibition was opened by Prince Albert Victor of Wales, and
the dial was called after him. The other seven mottoes are given under
their several headings (see Nos.
61,
656,
706,
1404,
1405,
1412,
1649).
The dial was removed when the Exhibition was taken down, and it
is not known what became of it. The same motto is at Whitchester,
Duns, Berwick, on a dial erected for Andrew Smith, Esq., by Mr.
Bryson. It has also been inscribed on the new base of an ancient dial
with twelve faces, a "dodecahedron," which was brought by Sir William
Wedderburn, Bart., from Inveresk Lodge, Midlothian, and erected at
Meredith Court, Gloucestershire. This dial is dated 1691.

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